CBS Reporter Bob Simon, Dead at 73

Bob Simon of the 60 Minutes show on CBS died on Wednesday after a terrible automobile accident. In an era where newsmen have figured out how to insert themselves into the news and how to gravitate themselves into celebrity status, Bob Simon did his job and it is well accepted in the industry that he did it very well.

This from Reuters:

Veteran CBS News correspondent Bob Simon, whose decades-long career included covering major overseas conflicts and surviving Iraqi prison, was killed in a car accident on Wednesday in New York City, police and CBS said. He was 73.

A longtime member of the network’s “60 Minutes” on-air team, Simon was a passenger in a hired car that slammed into a Mercedez Benz and then hit metal lane barriers on Manhattan’s West Side around 6:45 p.m. ET, New York City police said.

Simon suffered injuries to his head and torso and was pronounced dead on arrival at Saint Luke’s Roosevelt Hospital, police said.

The 44-year-old driver of the hired car was in a stable condition at Bellevue Hospital with injuries to his arms and legs. The driver of the Mercedes was not injured.

No arrests have been made, and police were investigating the crash.

Prominent journalists and producers were swift to pay tribute to Simon both online and on-air.

“Bob was for the last five decades simply one of the best, in my opinion the best, in the world at getting a story, telling a story, writing a story, and making it… (read more)